Mine would have to be this edgelord guy. He always wanted to seem super cool and dark and would never let anybody do what they wanted. His alignment was chaotic neutral but his actions were more chaotic evil.
I'm thinking pretty much all people, who wanted to make the campaign their own story with no room for anyone else to have their own part in it, are going to make this list.
My contribution: The DM who wanted to tell his story and his story only - one track, one train. All aboard or GTFO.
The first 4 to die during the course of the campaign were from inexplicable, random events that happened when the player didn't approach a situation (social or combat) head-on. The DM didn't care about metagaming knowledge - almost seemed to expect it, but the final 4 had a TPW, and because it didn't seem all that difficult of an encounter, I'm not sure that they didn't instigate it out of protest for being railroaded - just to get out of the campaign. The guy who DMed never played with us again despite being invited - a convenient excuse every time. The common assumption was that he was angry that we ruined his epic story by everyone dying before the end of it.
On the contrary in another campaign, we had a character in the campaign who definitely qualified as an "edgelord" of the highest degree, but the player made it fun by going overboard with the whole trope while contributing to the overall story (and not trying to dominate the overall story) and being cool with the rest of us messing around in her over-the-top sob story. We (all of us) were always laughing. I think the phrase for it is called, "subverting the stereotype". ...but she never made it all about her character. It was her character dropped into a bigger story with 4 others.
It's not edgelords but controllers who tend to make things unpleasant regardless of their role in the game and regardless of their roleplay.
That's not to say roleplaying a controller is necessarily bad: The character who tries to be the leader and have the limelight - the attention-starved - but the player has no misgivings about the character's real, lesser status in the party and is totally fine with everyone having fun with the character's need for glory. When the player's the controller, that's when problems appear.
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Human. Male. Possibly. Don't be a divider. My characters' backgrounds are written like instruction manuals rather than stories. My opinion and preferences don't mean you're wrong. I am 99.7603% convinced that the digital dice are messing with me. I roll high when nobody's looking and low when anyone else can see.🎲 “It's a bit early to be thinking about an epitaph. No?” will be my epitaph.
I'm thinking pretty much all people, who wanted to make the campaign their own story with no room for anyone else to have their own part in it, are going to make this list.
Yup. That is what makes for the worst players. "It's all about me."
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WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
The worst? I'd have to say it was a guy I ended up gaming with for a few years. He started out as a GM, but he maintained several GMPCs in the party who we'd keep finding loot that only they could use. And he would regularly throw challenges at the party that were level-inappropriate and the GMPCs would save us from.
Then that campaign ended and he and I both ended up in a game with a different GM. Problem player was, in his mind, the greatest D&D player in the history of the world (also the greatest of a lot of other things). But he didn't actually know the rules very well so he'd spend half of most sessions arguing with the GM (one of my personal favorites was his insistence that you could make an acrobatics check as a free action to get a bonus to AC in combat). And he was prone to making up stories about how he was the best player in the game and carried the day for everyone else all the time.
Case in point, the party needed to cross a bay. We found a guy with a boat and started negotiating with him when Mr Hero decided that it was taking too long and just paid him the obviously inflated asking price.
We get across the bay and find that, surprise surprise, the guy we hired was in league with the local pirates and had sent a message (via signal mirror) that we were a loaded target. So there's a group of pirates with crossbows waiting for us at the dock. We again try the social thing, only for Mr Hero to announce that it was "pointless" and jump up to attack the pirates, who outnumbered us and had readied actions.
He's immediately shot five times and gets surrounded.
His character was a Wizard 2/Monk 3, because he insisted that this was an extremely powerful multiclass combo. Nevermind that he couldn't fight his way out of a wet paper bag, his AC was abysmal, and his spellcasting was useless. I jumped my character, a dwarven fighter, up next to him and set up a back-to-back situation where we could prevent each other from being flanked. As long as we stayed together, we would have been all right.
Naturally, he fled back to the boat and started taking Total Defense Actions.
So suddenly I was now surrounded and fighting for my life. This went on for a few rounds before we won, no thanks to Mr Hero. When I ran into him at the comic book store a few days later, he proceeded to tell me all about how he'd single-handedly "saved" the party from the GM's BS scenario, having somehow forgotten that I'd been at the table with him.
He also, due to not knowing the rules, was very, very prone to arguing about them with the GM, which eventually got him kicked out of the party. Everyone else remarked that it was amazing how much more fun the game was with him gone- we actually got stuff done instead of having to listen to him insist that there was some way his character could make a skill check to do prevent damage or get extra loot.
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Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
Absolutely seconding, "It's not edgelords but controllers who tend to make things unpleasant regardless of their role in the game and regardless of their roleplay."
Fortunately my current group has none of that, and I am grateful for it every single session. A close second for me would be the player on their phone and never paying attention that starts every interaction with, "Wait, what's happening?"
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Much that once was is lost. Objects in Mirror Image are closer than they appear. All the world's indeed a stage, and we are merely players, performers and portrayers...
I'm thinking pretty much all people, who wanted to make the campaign their own story with no room for anyone else to have their own part in it, are going to make this list.
Yup. That is what makes for the worst players. "It's all about me."
But its not about those folks that think the game is all about them, I actually know it is about me and your just a supporting character lol. But ya those guys and gals do suck.
Characters who are edgelords can be fun and memorable. Players who are edgelords are universally terrible because by definition they're trying to be disruptive to what other players want to accomplish in order to show off how "edgy" they are.
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Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
Worst I have and sadly still play with is the disinterested guy. Shows up 30 - 45 mins late to start, does not know what his class can do. Is given PDFs and flowcharts to assist him but does not use them or tosses them aside. Will derail RP moments to make jokes or start a conversation that has nothing to do with the topic at hand. We play on VTT and when his turn comes up in initiative we need to raise our voices or text him to come back to the table. He then asks for a recap of what’s going on. Love getting an hour and half play time out of a three hour session.
Had a fella who used to come to the table, falsifying his dice rolls and otherwise always being the 'leader' of the group whenever it came to the social side of things. Never played true to what his character would say and always knew WHAT to say to get what the group wanted. On one hand it was good but on the other no one else has a chance to ask anything. Very annoying.
Eventually removed himself from the group when the DM messaged him telling him to pack it in; multiple witness accounts around the table telling us that he has been fudging his rolls and when he was told off about it, he never showed up again after a couple of sessions because we all knew what he had done. Taking a gifted PHB with him that he never read to learn about any rules. Always asking how to do something and when told to read the book he'd say "I'll read it when I get home."
Hopping on with the "it's the player not the edgelord character". I've played an edgelordy character. Shadow Sorc named Donovan Shademire (Donovan means 'dark warrior'). Dressed in all black. Sob story background filled with death. Connected to the Shadowfell - a realm of death. By all accounts he screamed Edgelord. So of course I played him as jovial, who pranked people and enjoyed life. His philosophy was everyone dies at some point so make the most of what life you have - so that when you do finally die you won't have any regrets looking back. Death is a friend, the reminder of what awaits, to encourage you to live now. Death shouldn't be feared, it should be accepted, it is a teacher and its lessons make us stronger - the knowledge it grants is freedom. Live, enjoy, embrace all you can so in those final days you can walk into what is beyond, hand-in-hand with Death, with a smile on your face and a light in your heart.
I've been in games where the DM was too involved in backstory and had a DM vs Players mentality: we went in to a shop to buy a map. The shopkeeper delved into lore and backstory for 2-hours. Nobody asked that shopkeep about anything, just "do you have a map", and nobody was asking questions or anything. It was just us waiting 2 hours for the DM to stop loredumping about stuff that had absolutely nothing to do anything the party was involved in, in any way. This DM also tried to screw over the party and didn't like me questioning that so kicked me out. That was all the first session.
In another game the DM had a DMPC who just so happened to have the skills for any situation and it just so happened all magic items we found were perfect for that DMPC.
There was a player who played their edgelord rogue too much as the stereotype: he was a dick to everyone, and deliberately kept running off from the party in what he (both character and player) knew were wrong directions. No reason given. His communication to all characters was a grunt, silence or an insult - nothing else.
I did not last long in those games. I don't have time or patience for that. I am so thankful I found the group and DM I'm with now -and have been for what is upwards of 2 years now. Great bunch of peeps, the DM is excellent and we've had a blast.
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Click ✨ HERE ✨ For My Youtube Videos featuring Guides, Tips & Tricks for using D&D Beyond. Need help with Homebrew? Check out ✨ thisFAQ/Guide thread ✨ by IamSposta.
Back in 2e there was a guy in the group that would only ever play a Kender (or if not available, a Gnome), only ever as C/n, and only ever played a Wild Magic User. Every DM in the group eventually banned both races and Wild Magic altogether.
I'm thinking pretty much all people, who wanted to make the campaign their own story with no room for anyone else to have their own part in it, are going to make this list.
My contribution: The DM who wanted to tell his story and his story only - one track, one train. All aboard or GTFO.
The first 4 to die during the course of the campaign were from inexplicable, random events that happened when the player didn't approach a situation (social or combat) head-on. The DM didn't care about metagaming knowledge - almost seemed to expect it, but the final 4 had a TPW, and because it didn't seem all that difficult of an encounter, I'm not sure that they didn't instigate it out of protest for being railroaded - just to get out of the campaign. The guy who DMed never played with us again despite being invited - a convenient excuse every time. The common assumption was that he was angry that we ruined his epic story by everyone dying before the end of it.
On the contrary in another campaign, we had a character in the campaign who definitely qualified as an "edgelord" of the highest degree, but the player made it fun by going overboard with the whole trope while contributing to the overall story (and not trying to dominate the overall story) and being cool with the rest of us messing around in her over-the-top sob story. We (all of us) were always laughing. I think the phrase for it is called, "subverting the stereotype". ...but she never made it all about her character. It was her character dropped into a bigger story with 4 others.
It's not edgelords but controllers who tend to make things unpleasant regardless of their role in the game and regardless of their roleplay.
That's not to say roleplaying a controller is necessarily bad: The character who tries to be the leader and have the limelight - the attention-starved - but the player has no misgivings about the character's real, lesser status in the party and is totally fine with everyone having fun with the character's need for glory. When the player's the controller, that's when problems appear.
That is true, but this guy was a controller. He wouldn't let anybody do anything, everything was "Me me me" with him. He would always leave a path of dead innocents in his wake, and tried to kill us at one point.
I had just joined a new group (I think this was my second session with them), and our DM had some obligation but we met up anyway. I decided to improvise a quick one-shot. (Terrible idea, I know.) But this one player decided to attack another party member without being provoked by anything. Just attacked. It was pretty bad.
I once played with this guy whose character was a high elf fighter, and he kept trying to punch another character (a sly and sarcastic rogue) in the face. As you probably can imagine, it did not go very well for him.
In one game we had drowe as the general enemy that we encountered intermittently. One of the PCs unfortunately died, and the player decided to play a drow. His character turned up somewhere, and we promptly killed him!
Decades ago we had a player that we nicknamed F111 - he would always play the same multiclass character.
Actually, worst game was where initiative was rolled at the start of every round - combat slowed to a complete halt since the GM had to collect the new initiative values from each player (there were 5 or 6 of us). In the same campaign we had a mage who would take what felt like minutes to decide which spell to cast each time.
Mine would have to be this edgelord guy. He always wanted to seem super cool and dark and would never let anybody do what they wanted. His alignment was chaotic neutral but his actions were more chaotic evil.
SAUCE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I'm thinking pretty much all people, who wanted to make the campaign their own story with no room for anyone else to have their own part in it, are going to make this list.
My contribution: The DM who wanted to tell his story and his story only - one track, one train. All aboard or GTFO.
The first 4 to die during the course of the campaign were from inexplicable, random events that happened when the player didn't approach a situation (social or combat) head-on. The DM didn't care about metagaming knowledge - almost seemed to expect it, but the final 4 had a TPW, and because it didn't seem all that difficult of an encounter, I'm not sure that they didn't instigate it out of protest for being railroaded - just to get out of the campaign. The guy who DMed never played with us again despite being invited - a convenient excuse every time. The common assumption was that he was angry that we ruined his epic story by everyone dying before the end of it.
On the contrary in another campaign, we had a character in the campaign who definitely qualified as an "edgelord" of the highest degree, but the player made it fun by going overboard with the whole trope while contributing to the overall story (and not trying to dominate the overall story) and being cool with the rest of us messing around in her over-the-top sob story. We (all of us) were always laughing. I think the phrase for it is called, "subverting the stereotype". ...but she never made it all about her character. It was her character dropped into a bigger story with 4 others.
It's not edgelords but controllers who tend to make things unpleasant regardless of their role in the game and regardless of their roleplay.
That's not to say roleplaying a controller is necessarily bad: The character who tries to be the leader and have the limelight - the attention-starved - but the player has no misgivings about the character's real, lesser status in the party and is totally fine with everyone having fun with the character's need for glory. When the player's the controller, that's when problems appear.
Human. Male. Possibly. Don't be a divider.
My characters' backgrounds are written like instruction manuals rather than stories. My opinion and preferences don't mean you're wrong.
I am 99.7603% convinced that the digital dice are messing with me. I roll high when nobody's looking and low when anyone else can see.🎲
“It's a bit early to be thinking about an epitaph. No?” will be my epitaph.
Yup. That is what makes for the worst players. "It's all about me."
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
The worst? I'd have to say it was a guy I ended up gaming with for a few years. He started out as a GM, but he maintained several GMPCs in the party who we'd keep finding loot that only they could use. And he would regularly throw challenges at the party that were level-inappropriate and the GMPCs would save us from.
Then that campaign ended and he and I both ended up in a game with a different GM. Problem player was, in his mind, the greatest D&D player in the history of the world (also the greatest of a lot of other things). But he didn't actually know the rules very well so he'd spend half of most sessions arguing with the GM (one of my personal favorites was his insistence that you could make an acrobatics check as a free action to get a bonus to AC in combat). And he was prone to making up stories about how he was the best player in the game and carried the day for everyone else all the time.
Case in point, the party needed to cross a bay. We found a guy with a boat and started negotiating with him when Mr Hero decided that it was taking too long and just paid him the obviously inflated asking price.
We get across the bay and find that, surprise surprise, the guy we hired was in league with the local pirates and had sent a message (via signal mirror) that we were a loaded target. So there's a group of pirates with crossbows waiting for us at the dock. We again try the social thing, only for Mr Hero to announce that it was "pointless" and jump up to attack the pirates, who outnumbered us and had readied actions.
He's immediately shot five times and gets surrounded.
His character was a Wizard 2/Monk 3, because he insisted that this was an extremely powerful multiclass combo. Nevermind that he couldn't fight his way out of a wet paper bag, his AC was abysmal, and his spellcasting was useless. I jumped my character, a dwarven fighter, up next to him and set up a back-to-back situation where we could prevent each other from being flanked. As long as we stayed together, we would have been all right.
Naturally, he fled back to the boat and started taking Total Defense Actions.
So suddenly I was now surrounded and fighting for my life. This went on for a few rounds before we won, no thanks to Mr Hero. When I ran into him at the comic book store a few days later, he proceeded to tell me all about how he'd single-handedly "saved" the party from the GM's BS scenario, having somehow forgotten that I'd been at the table with him.
He also, due to not knowing the rules, was very, very prone to arguing about them with the GM, which eventually got him kicked out of the party. Everyone else remarked that it was amazing how much more fun the game was with him gone- we actually got stuff done instead of having to listen to him insist that there was some way his character could make a skill check to do prevent damage or get extra loot.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
Absolutely seconding, "It's not edgelords but controllers who tend to make things unpleasant regardless of their role in the game and regardless of their roleplay."
Fortunately my current group has none of that, and I am grateful for it every single session. A close second for me would be the player on their phone and never paying attention that starts every interaction with, "Wait, what's happening?"
Much that once was is lost.
Objects in Mirror Image are closer than they appear.
All the world's indeed a stage, and we are merely players, performers and portrayers...
But its not about those folks that think the game is all about them, I actually know it is about me and your just a supporting character lol. But ya those guys and gals do suck.
Characters who are edgelords can be fun and memorable. Players who are edgelords are universally terrible because by definition they're trying to be disruptive to what other players want to accomplish in order to show off how "edgy" they are.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
For me, it a player in my group who is an monologue RP hog. He wastes a good hour of a 4 hour session doing this.
And when we're in combat, he takes a good 3-5 minutes to decide what to do on his turn.
Worst I have and sadly still play with is the disinterested guy. Shows up 30 - 45 mins late to start, does not know what his class can do. Is given PDFs and flowcharts to assist him but does not use them or tosses them aside. Will derail RP moments to make jokes or start a conversation that has nothing to do with the topic at hand. We play on VTT and when his turn comes up in initiative we need to raise our voices or text him to come back to the table. He then asks for a recap of what’s going on. Love getting an hour and half play time out of a three hour session.
Give me a narcissistic edgelord any day.
Wow. With that level of enthusiasm it's a wonder he even bothers showing up for games.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
Had a fella who used to come to the table, falsifying his dice rolls and otherwise always being the 'leader' of the group whenever it came to the social side of things. Never played true to what his character would say and always knew WHAT to say to get what the group wanted. On one hand it was good but on the other no one else has a chance to ask anything. Very annoying.
Eventually removed himself from the group when the DM messaged him telling him to pack it in; multiple witness accounts around the table telling us that he has been fudging his rolls and when he was told off about it, he never showed up again after a couple of sessions because we all knew what he had done. Taking a gifted PHB with him that he never read to learn about any rules. Always asking how to do something and when told to read the book he'd say "I'll read it when I get home."
Hopping on with the "it's the player not the edgelord character". I've played an edgelordy character. Shadow Sorc named Donovan Shademire (Donovan means 'dark warrior'). Dressed in all black. Sob story background filled with death. Connected to the Shadowfell - a realm of death. By all accounts he screamed Edgelord. So of course I played him as jovial, who pranked people and enjoyed life. His philosophy was everyone dies at some point so make the most of what life you have - so that when you do finally die you won't have any regrets looking back. Death is a friend, the reminder of what awaits, to encourage you to live now. Death shouldn't be feared, it should be accepted, it is a teacher and its lessons make us stronger - the knowledge it grants is freedom. Live, enjoy, embrace all you can so in those final days you can walk into what is beyond, hand-in-hand with Death, with a smile on your face and a light in your heart.
I've been in games where the DM was too involved in backstory and had a DM vs Players mentality: we went in to a shop to buy a map. The shopkeeper delved into lore and backstory for 2-hours. Nobody asked that shopkeep about anything, just "do you have a map", and nobody was asking questions or anything. It was just us waiting 2 hours for the DM to stop loredumping about stuff that had absolutely nothing to do anything the party was involved in, in any way. This DM also tried to screw over the party and didn't like me questioning that so kicked me out. That was all the first session.
In another game the DM had a DMPC who just so happened to have the skills for any situation and it just so happened all magic items we found were perfect for that DMPC.
There was a player who played their edgelord rogue too much as the stereotype: he was a dick to everyone, and deliberately kept running off from the party in what he (both character and player) knew were wrong directions. No reason given. His communication to all characters was a grunt, silence or an insult - nothing else.
I did not last long in those games. I don't have time or patience for that. I am so thankful I found the group and DM I'm with now -and have been for what is upwards of 2 years now. Great bunch of peeps, the DM is excellent and we've had a blast.
Click ✨ HERE ✨ For My Youtube Videos featuring Guides, Tips & Tricks for using D&D Beyond.
Need help with Homebrew? Check out ✨ this FAQ/Guide thread ✨ by IamSposta.
Back in 2e there was a guy in the group that would only ever play a Kender (or if not available, a Gnome), only ever as C/n, and only ever played a Wild Magic User. Every DM in the group eventually banned both races and Wild Magic altogether.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
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Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
Most GMs I knew in 2nd Edition banned Kender as a matter of principle. They were considered the Scrappy Doo of D&D.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
Scrappy-Doo would have been cool, this was like Child’s Play meets Leprechaun meets Gremlins meets the muppets.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
That is true, but this guy was a controller. He wouldn't let anybody do anything, everything was "Me me me" with him. He would always leave a path of dead innocents in his wake, and tried to kill us at one point.
SAUCE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I had just joined a new group (I think this was my second session with them), and our DM had some obligation but we met up anyway. I decided to improvise a quick one-shot. (Terrible idea, I know.) But this one player decided to attack another party member without being provoked by anything. Just attacked. It was pretty bad.
I have no personality.
I once played with this guy whose character was a high elf fighter, and he kept trying to punch another character (a sly and sarcastic rogue) in the face. As you probably can imagine, it did not go very well for him.
Certified gay geek
Still don’t really know how to play this game, but I love it anyway.
he/they
Reminds me of a 3rd edition game when an 11th level fighter decided to try bullying my 11th level wizard.
It went poorly for him.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
In one game we had drowe as the general enemy that we encountered intermittently. One of the PCs unfortunately died, and the player decided to play a drow. His character turned up somewhere, and we promptly killed him!
Decades ago we had a player that we nicknamed F111 - he would always play the same multiclass character.
Actually, worst game was where initiative was rolled at the start of every round - combat slowed to a complete halt since the GM had to collect the new initiative values from each player (there were 5 or 6 of us). In the same campaign we had a mage who would take what felt like minutes to decide which spell to cast each time.